Better Together: When the Group Speaks With One Voice

Our Gemara on Amud Aleph uses an interesting phrase to describe the emergence of a Torah idea or ruling: “Nizreka mi-pi chaburah,” which translates as “it came out from the group of sages.”

The Hebrew word “Nizreka” has a connotation of thrown or ejected. Meleches Shlomo (Mishna Tamid 3:8) explains it as a phenomenon where everyone in the group spontaneously and independently arrived at the same conclusion — giving it increased veracity since many thoughts and personalities aligned and just suddenly were shared.

This phrase occurs several times in Shas, but I believe exclusively in relation to one sage, Chiyyah bar Gamda. (See Shabbos 3a, and Pesachim 64a, 73b.)

Is there some connection to Rav Chiyyah bar Gamda’s mode of thought that evokes this unanimity and connection amongst his colleagues? Perhaps. One such Torah thought that “came out from the group” is (Shabbos 3a) where the ruling is that if two people performed a forbidden act of work on Shabbos, it’s not a violation. (Shnayim sh-asa-uhu peturim.) Together is apparently a different energy, and not like a single person doing a single act.

Is the idea of the distinct dynamic of a group part of a broader personal philosophy that allowed Rav Chiyyah bar Gamda to energize his colleagues?

Another teaching of Rav Chiyyah bar Gamda is from Bereishis Rabbah (17:2): “Whoever is without a wife is not considered a full human.”

Possibly this teaching is also connected to a broader philosophy, in respecting the quality of partnership. The most significant partnership that one can have is with their spouse. The ability to collaborate, connect and negotiate the built-in masculine and feminine traits and perspectives is what allows creation to occur, literally and figuratively. Creation is evoked in the presence of opposites. Successfully hearing and integrating the disparate views of the groups can lead to an eruption of spontaneous, unanimous truth.

I’ll conclude with my own home-grown chassidish vort: Shnayim sh-asa-uhu peturim — When two people act in unison together, it exempts them from harsh judgment and misfortune.

Don’t Reassure Me: When Kindness Feeds the Compulsion

Our Gemara on Amud Aleph discusses the halacha of an accidental immersion of a woman in the Mikvah without intent. One opinion holds that she is permitted to have relations but she still remains forbidden to eat Terumah and other holy foods.

However,........

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